Manitoba reports 40 new COVID-19 cases

Another 40 COVID-19 infections have been identified in Manitoba.

The majority of the new cases reported on the province’s COVID-19 dashboard Tuesday — 19 infections — come from the Winnipeg Health region.

Ten cases were found in the Northern Health region, four were reported in both the Southern and Prairie Mountain Health regions, and three were reported in the Interlake-Eastern Health region.

There province’s COVID-19 death toll remains at 1,188, according to the provincial site.

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The site shows there are 64 Manitobans in hospital as a result of COVID-19 and 18 who require intensive care.

Manitoba’s five-day test positivity rate sits at 2.4 per cent.

The latest COVID-19 data comes as officials announced plans Tuesday to reinstate a mask mandate in all indoor spaces and said all front-line provincial employees who work with vulnerable populations will have to be fully vaccinated or undergo regular testing.

Manitoba’s chief public health officer, Dr. Brent Roussin, said the stronger orders are needed to guard against variants, especially the Delta strain, first identified in India.

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At last word Tuesday 185 of Manitoba’s 362 active cases have been confirmed to be variants of concern.

A provincial site tracking variants shows 43 active variant cases are the Alpha variant, first identified in the United Kingdom, 13 are the Delta strain, and another 129 have yet to be specified.

Since the first variant case was discovered in Manitoba in February, the province has recorded 17,142 cases and 191 deaths have been linked to the more-contagious strains.

In all, Manitoba has reported 58,322 lab-confirmed cases of COVID-19 since March 2020.

Questions about COVID-19? Here are some things you need to know:

Symptoms can include fever, cough and difficulty breathing — very similar to a cold or flu. Some people can develop a more severe illness. People most at risk of this include older adults and people with severe chronic medical conditions like heart, lung or kidney disease. If you develop symptoms, contact public health authorities.

To prevent the virus from spreading, experts recommend frequent handwashing and coughing into your sleeve. They also recommend minimizing contact with others, staying home as much as possible and maintaining a distance of two metres from other people if you go out. In situations where you can’t keep a safe distance from others, public health officials recommend the use of a non-medical face mask or covering to prevent spreading the respiratory droplets that can carry the virus. In some provinces and municipalities across the country, masks or face coverings are now mandatory in indoor public spaces.

For full COVID-19 coverage from Global News, visit our coronavirus page.